Increased efficiency of mailing operations of all sorts has necessitated reliance upon a variety of machines which conduct various parts of the mailing operation. Such machines have been developed for stuffing materials into envelopes. Machines have been developed for addressing envelopes. Machines have been developed for closing and sealing envelopes, and the list goes on.
As a consequence, fully automated mailing systems can be made and the same work extremely well. However, there occasionally occurs a hang-up in the system as, when one piece of mail catches on another piece of mail or on a part of the machinery employed in the system.
By way of example, many systems in use today employ a Model 9700 printer manufactured by the Xerox Corporation. The printer may be utilized in the addressing of envelopes. Conventional business size envelopes with normal non linear contoured flaps are too short to feed through these printers and will jam in various places. In an effort to avoid this particular problem, some prior art proposals utilize an ultra wide envelope assembly having an enlarged flap. That is to say, the size of the flap is on the order of the same size as the body of the remainder of the envelope.
This type of construction feeds relatively easily but introduces new difficulties. For one, in outfeeding these printed envelopes, they are fed to a stack and the arrangement is such that there is a possibility that an envelope being fed to the stack will hang up on the subjacent envelope in the stack. Frequently, the hang-up may be caused by the bottom edge of this elongated flap envelope being caught in the opening to the envelope pocket of the subjacent envelope in the stack.
When such occurs, manual operator intervention to straighten the stack and clear the proceeding sections of the printer is required; and such defeats the purpose of automation.
Secondly, the nature of this construction is such that it does not have the appearance of a conventional envelope and thus does not appear to be individualized as might be desired.
Thirdly, and perhaps more importantly, in designing the an envelope with an elongated flap, the prior art has provided an envelope that is not readily capable of being stuffed and sealed in most automatic equipment.
The present invention is directed to overcoming one or more of the above problems.